There is a spread of AV appliances in various kinds for recording/reproducing video data, audio data, etc., e.g. as video tape recorders and disk recorders/players having, as recording mediums, magnetic tapes and optical disks, magnetooptical disks, memory cards and the like. Recently, there have been developed appliances for recording/reproducing a diversity of contents (multimedia contents) of video, music, data files, etc. by using large-capacity recording mediums, e.g. HDDs (hard disk drives).
For example, a recording/reproducing section having an HDD as a recording medium is provided on a digital broadcast tuner, being realized as a recording/reproducing apparatus capable of recording broadcast programs.
In the meanwhile, because the conventional video tape recorder or the like is small in recordable capacity, the user is allowed to grasp a video content, etc. recorded on the video tape or the like. If unnecessary, it is used by overwrite-recording. Thus, there is no need to automatically manage the recorded contents, e.g. automatically erase unwanted contents.
Meanwhile, because there is no electronic additional information for the apparatus to grasp a content, automatic management of contents is impossible to implement.
However, in the digital audio/video recorder using a recent large-capacity random-accessible hard disk, storage capacity is great. This makes difficult for the user to grasp all the recorded contents. Meanwhile, there becomes troublesome in such management that the user deletes unnecessary contents by himself/herself. Also, on even a large-capacity recording medium, if unnecessary contents are left over a long time, it some time becomes full in capacity, resulting in a situation not for recording furthermore.
For this reason, it is desired to automatically implement content management on the apparatus side in order to improve the user's operationality.
Meanwhile, in the usual scheduling for picture-recording, when the user is making a scheduling operation, in the case it is determined that the storage device capacity required for picture-recording cannot be secured, the contents can be erased in an interactive form with the user.
However, the recording/reproducing apparatus using an HDD has a function to automatically picture-record a broadcast program on the basis of user's taste or viewing history, or a program recommended from a broadcast station or service site. The user does not carry out operations in executing such automatic picture-recording. Namely, recording proceeds regardless of user's intention. In this case, even in case capacity is insufficient, it is impossible to delete unwanted contents by an interactive form with the user.
From this fact, content management with automatic erasure is desired in order to secure a recording domain of storage device at all times.
Herein, as a technique for automatically managing the contents recorded on the HDD for example, there is known for example an automatic deleting function of automatically deletion from old contents. Namely, content recording date-and-time is placed under management, to delete those as required in the order of older recording date-and-time.
In this case, however, because deletion is by reason that a certain content is old, there is a case improper for the user. For example, it is improper to delete, because of the reason of old, a content the user likes and enjoys reproduction repeatedly.
Meanwhile, as disclosed in JP-A-11-18039, there are those for automatically erasing a content by utilization of whether a content has been reproduced or not or of the information about the number of times of reproductions. However, there are cases considered not proper in the scheme of determining a subject of automatic deletion on the basis of a presence or absence of reproduction or the number of times thereof.
For example, news program, once viewed, can be deleted usually. However, in the case of music video, the more the number of times of reproductions are, the higher the user possibly views it again. Hence, it should not be a subject of deletion.
Meanwhile, as disclosed in JP-A-2000-21136, there is also a scheme that the user selects four levels of “Save Unconditional”, “Auto Delete After Viewing”, “Auto Delete Upon Passing Save Period” and “Auto Delete Unconditional” on each recorded content so that the system can manage contents as per user's designation. This reflects user's intention, preventing against improper deletion. However, the user is required to designate multi-stage management levels on each content, hence troublesome for the user. For example, the user is uncertain of in his/her decision as to which management level is to be taken for the content, and feels troublesomeness in designating the management levels in plural stages.
Meanwhile, if the user should designate “Save Unconditional” or “Auto Delete After Viewing” for the most of contents, there is a possibility to cause a situation that, when delete execution is needed, there is no contents for deletion.
Considering the current situation that storage capacity increase is in rapid advancement for the multimedia content recording/reproducing apparatus using an HDD or the like, it can be expected for the user to manage recorded contents. Importance is placed on content management of automatically deleting unnecessary contents. The above schemes have a possibility to delete not along with user's intention, or encounter a case a comparatively heavy operation burden is imposed on the user or necessary deletion is not to be executed. This is not necessarily considered as proper control of automatic deletion.